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This challenge more and more shakes up my notion of what makes a story. I love this but just like all good educational experiences, the more I learn the more I discover my own cluelessness. Today’s shorty took hold once I settled on a playful conversation between a woman and her father, sitting at a dining table, waiting for dessert. And I found I wanted to stay firmly in that conversation—the story begins with the mother walking away from the dining table and ends when she returns. There is nothing approaching a traditional beginning, middle, and end, and there’s no story arc to speak of. I tried to develop an unspoken conversation beneath the surface of the exchanges, but I don’t know that I was terribly successful. And is this a story? It is a fiction and I was very conscious of my own decision about how to begin it and how to end it. But does that make it a story? All I know is that for the purposes of my Daily Shorty challenge, it is. And the photo today is pulling double-duty. The dessert our protagonists await is an apple pie. Let’s enjoy this gorgeous pie, too, as a celebration for completing Week 29. Yahoo!

Working Title: Apple Pie1st Sentence: “I wish I could live in an apple pie,” my father said, as we stared at the two-crust wonder my mother had placed in the center of the table before leaving to fetch the pie server.Favorite Sentence: “If a person has to ask herself—is this a pie, or is this my father—then you have a profound pie-definition problem.”Word Length: 839

Claire Guyton

can't thank the Maine Arts Commission enough for granting her their 2012 literary fellowship, which she used to launch Daily Shorty. Claire writes, edits, coaches other writers, and blogs in Lewiston, where she stays sane by working on her scraggly yard, running 5Ks as slowly as possible, perfecting cracker recipes, and playing badminton. She spends the remainder of her free time with her sweet husband and perfect cats. You can contact Claire at dailyshorty@gmail.com.